Pro-sparrow on, yo.

Y felicidad.  Well, Dixie Chicks, it’s been FOUR long years now since the top of the world came crashing down ... apparently I’m reeeeaaally taking the long way around.  Maybe I peaked early, and cracking 30 put me “over the hill,” so to speak.  As another year screeches to a halt, I reflect on the build-up of all my life’s accomplishments one after the other, the wall I smashed into, and the straight drop down. 

Straight A’s.  Scholarships. Awards.  Prodding from my professors to move onto Ivy League PhD programs.  But I stayed at my safe local university for my MA, because that’s what a practical, naive girl does.  I had a fiancé.  I had a life in mind, a plan that was going to unfold MY way.  I would graduate, get married, pop out kids, and embark on my middle-class career in a secure field. 

Turns out I had to ditch the guy along the way (and all my ideals about love), but the career!  Now that was going to be the shred of stability I could focus my perfectionism on.  I plodded on with my accomplishments, “growing” professionally by about five grand per year, always moving on to bigger and better opportunities.  And then it all vanished, never to be found again. 

I literally cannot figure out where I went.  The old me would not even recognize whatever I am now.  She would be disgusted by me.  She could not begin to relate to “giving up.” 

I am a nobody.  I am a has-been.  I am nothing to no one.  It used to be my life’s work to help people in this very frame of mind, now I can’t stand the thought of helping myself.  I can’t stand the thought of continuing to pretend all the time.  I can’t stand not being able to fix myself.  I sit here crying at the prospect of another year to get through.  I just don’t understand when it’s going to get better.  After all this time, why hasn’t it? 

It’s funny how, if you go long enough without something you thought you wanted sooooo bad, you can end up not wanting it anymore.  Period.  Like kids.  And marriage.  If given enough time, you’re forced to examine why you wanted life’s traditional ends to begin with.  You analyze the lives around you, and ask which shoes, if any, you long to be in. 

What if you can’t even find anyone to envy?  I mean, if you see someone who has something you want, you can try to go out and get it.  Well there’s nothing I want to go out and get, folks.  I’d rather sit around and waste away, apparently.  If you think long and hard enough, you may not end up finding the solutions to your life’s problems; instead, you may just grow terribly sick of mulling it all over endlessly.  

Holiday Blues

Tomorrow the relatives will all be at my parents’ house, and instead of avoiding the Christmas Eve charade as I’d planned, I’ll wear my fake smile and pretend I give a sh*t about all these people that have never given a damn about me.  Like Thanksgiving, my dad won’t be there, so reality’s creeping in.

I’m in a sour mood.  I didn’t anticipate this year being difficult as far as holidays go, because I’ve been feeling a little more even-keeled over all.  But then, I didn’t anticipate having to listen to my parents argue out the final details of the divorce settlement right before Christmas.  I thought this year I’d finally have a job and not have to feel like a failure once again when people ask what I’ve been up to.  I’m so sick of feeling like a loser.  Or else I’m sick of *being* a loser; one of the two.

Then there are the things you have no control over, like dreams about the past, and old memories creeping in.  Somehow the old pain flares up, like scar tissue that never quite healed right.  I try not to ponder too long on the happiness people from my past are experiencing in their lives; new babies and families that are celebrating instead of breaking apart.

Even still, the past hurts me.  The fact that my life fell apart over the holidays has hung over every Thanksgiving and Christmas since.  It’s easy to say that one shouldn’t allow things from so long ago to ruin the present, and I believe that if I were more satisfied with my current life I might have an easier time keeping the sadness out.  Instead, it’s one more unhappy year.  Maybe not quite as miserable as the few before, but gloomy nonetheless.

To top it off, my hip pain has really been flaring up, and I don’t know when I might be able to get insurance next.  Will life always be about coping with, and overcoming, and pulling through, and never about living?  I just want to be put into a drug-induced coma.  Srsly.

Suicide: What’s It About?

I mean, fundamentally, what does it come down to?

Sometimes I think suicide is about pain.  The too much, never-ending, all-encompassing pain of existence.  The kind that wrenches you from the inside out. 

Or it could be escape.  Maybe we just need a way out when we’re out of options.  Sometimes all the options suck, and it’s truly the lesser of the evils.  Sometimes we’re too paralyzed with indecision to even*pick* an option.  Or there are so many options we don’t want the responsibility of being forced to choose one, and then live with the consequences. 

What about love?  Maybe it’s a lack of love.  Love from others.  From family.  Love for our own self.  Like Matchbox Twenty, “I don’t know if I’ve ever been really loved ... by a hand that’s touched me.”  And I feel like something should have given by now.  And I’m more than a little bit angry.  I spent seven years in a relationship that was more dysfunction than love.  It wasted my time, my life, my .... goodness?  The part of me that believed in the grander meaning of love, the goodness of people; not the fairytale ending, mind you: I’ve never bought into that.  But there’s a certain kind of lasting spiritual connection to another human being I used to believe in, which got trampled along the way.

So then maybe it’s anger.  I’m so angry at the people in my past, my present, and probably my damn future that I can’t stand myself sometimes.  I’m angry at life for all the things it could be, but is not.  I’m angry either AT God or that I don’t believe in God, one of the two.

Religion, then?  A lack of faith in anything or anyone?  The fact that everything I’ve ever trusted in has left me despairing? Religion, after all, is “ultimate” in our lives, so perhaps it’s the *ultimate* disappointment, the overarching emptiness, the aching whole in life that I have no way to fill.

Other times, I think it’s about needs that will never be met.  And I’m not talking about food, shelter or water – although sometimes the mere act of trying to survive is enough to take us out – but also human needs.  Affection.  Companionship.  Trust.  Security.  Sometimes I ask myself what I will do if I never experience these things again.  If no one ever hugs me or holds me or stands by me.  More importantly, what if I never have sex again?  I’m not effing kidding here, I miss it.  What if neither the grand nor base pleasures of life come my way again; is a world without joy a place worth staying?

It might just be the struggle.  On days like today, my being wants there to be a foreseeable end to this sensation that I’m trying to run through water.  I’m tired.  I’m just sooo, soo tired of trying.  And failing.  And flailing.  And having to try again.  It feels as though, at any given moment, one more try will be too much to bear. 

Maybe it’s all these things.  Maybe it’s about being human.  Maybe it’s far more universal a concept than we’re led to believe in our shame-ridden society.  Maybe it’s the knowing that I’m not alone in all these feelings, yet being unable to connect to anyone in any profound, meaningful way.  So many things well up inside with no outlet; despair ensues. 

Alienation, then?  The outsider to life, always looking in, wondering how the others are making it?  

Merry Christmas: The Divorce is Final

With less than a week left ‘till Christmas, my parents are traipsing into their respective divorce lawyers’ offices today to make it official: their marriage is over.  After a year and 9 months of the back-and-forth, could it really not have waited a couple more days, I ask?  As much as I wanted the whole thing to be over with, having the reality slap you in the face in the midst of this “joyous” time of year is just too much for anyone involved....my parents, my sister and me, the grandkids. 

The timing makes the irony of our holiday plans all the more ironic: all of my dad's relatives will be at the house, but my dad won't.  This will be the first in a series of awkward holidays, tinged with the bitter sadness of what is missing.  

No one tells you how to deal with this as an adult.  There are a thousand books for little kids who have parents that are splitting up, and for grown-ups who survived divorce as kids.  But for those of us whose parents have been married for 20-, 30-, 40-odd years ... where’s the manual?  How do I keep this from feeding right into my cynical outlook on life and love?  Where do I look to see the plausibility of a happy ever after?

It’s gonna be a holly, jolly Christmas: that’s for sure.

Six Weeks, Two Days, Three and a Half Hours

Doesn’t sound like a very long time, does it? Well, it’s the longest I’ve lasted at any job in the past 4 years. Woohoo for the personal record I set there, bummer that I had to stick the punctuation mark at the end of that sentence today. I wanted it to work out. Desperately. But given my history with sales focused jobs, the writing was on the wall from the beginning.

Nonetheless, I accomplished a few small feats in the short weeks I was able to remain gainfully employed . . . pretend you’re impressed:

1. I arrived early to work every single day. Sometimes by 15 minutes! I realize other grown-ups do not consider this a marvel because they are on time to their jobs every single day. As a perpetually-5-minutes-late person, however, this goes down as a bloody effing miracle in my book. And no, I’m not English.

2. I (almost) secured a full-time position with benefits . . . if I would’ve met the metrics required to last beyond the probationary period, that is. The only other time that’s happened these past 4 years was when I got hired to sell gym memberships. Lasted one day at that.

3. I functioned as a semi-normal human being for the entire duration. I showered daily, put on makeup, and did my hair. I packed a lunch, ran errands, did chores when I got home, and carried out the mundane tasks of living. Again, not a grand triumph unless you barely leave the house. Brushed my teeth twice a day even, how do ya like that?

4. I socialized both in- and outside of work and was only a grouchy introvert a small portion of the time. In fact, I made a few friends and found it could be plausible that I am an acceptable human being. I went out for (3) drinks and pushed through my feelings of being a pathetic loser while surrounded by blackout-drunk coworkers who seemed to be just getting started as I was cashing in for the night. I stayed past what was comfortable, so at least I stretched outside of my box even if I’ll never fit in with my peers.

So I rejoined the land of the living. For a brief spell, at least. Built up some momentum. Now it’s time to hunker down, fill out a thousand online job apps again and pray to high heaven I don’t fall back into severe malfunction.

Unrelaxing relaxation.

I went for myofascial release today. 

Periodically my hip gets so bad that I nearly go berserk.  Then I google and research and strategize what I will attempt next to make the pain go away. 

So for various reasons I am running late to get to this appointment that is twice as far of a drive as I had allowed for.  Rushing to go relax, I thought to myself.  Makes a lot of sense. 

Because I am late, she forgoes the 2-minute clothing removal and does the MFR with my clothes on.  On any other day I would’ve thrown on yoga pants or something comfy, but no, toDAY I wear jeans.  Awesome. 

We can’t start on my hip right away because my sacrum is tilted out of whack, so we start with spinal decompression.  Have I ever injured my tailbone?  Why yes.  Yes I have. 

I knew I should have gone to the chiropractor first.  I scold myself for another failure.  I am annoyed that I always do the same crap, that I am always late, that I am supposed to be relaxing but my jeans aren’t very bendy and the whole thing is the opposite of the slow, gentle healing it is intended to be.  I wonder why I ever leave the house. 

She works on my jaw next.  I try to put aside my OCD issue about people touching my face in hopes that my TMJ will be alleviated, but mostly I think about my pores getting clogged and the breakouts I will wake up to tomorrow.

On the drive home I call to see if there are massage openings at this other place I go to sometimes.  In 25 minutes...perfect.  I squeeze in an adjustment since the chiro’s in the same building and, after all, why do another treatment when everything’s in the wrong place?  More scurrying around. 

For the massage I go bare.  Well technically, first I get on the table with my panties and my dignity in place, then I decide it will just make it awkward for her to access all the hip and glute muscles that have aching trigger points.  Sigh. 

Facedown with my head in the little circle, I fail to close my eyes soon enough and have to ponder the handwritten “grandpa” tattoo on her feet, along with her french-tipped toes.  She starts with my legs, and I anger at the stretch marks in places that weren’t there a couple of years ago.  I beat myself up over a few hundred more things. I panic at the slight breeze in my nethers, where a properly-tucked massage sheet normally should be shielding.  Oh, well.  Look at my privates.  See if I care. 

I tell myself that even fat people deserve massages as I internally apologize to the girl for having to squeegee across my fat rolls and dimples and stretch marks.  I contemplate the vulnerability of baring one’s ugliness to a complete stranger, who - truth be told - doesn't really have much of a say.  I wonder about the stories these people could tell of the bodies they have to look at.  The possibility, not the promise, of being in slightly less pain allows me to surrender to this humiliation. 

Accompanying me as always, the despair lingering beneath the surface.  This is my body I’ve destroyed that I don’t want anyone to ever see again, this body that nobody (save a massage therapist or doctor) has touched in years and maybe never will again.  This is my pain that may never go away that has ruined my life and my hope and my health.  This is my summation of failures in the world and the reason I don’t want to be with myself, much less someone else.  

Knowing when to give up

I've never been great at letting go.  At times, the refusal to quit is a great trait to have.  But there are those other moments in life when the line between persevering ... and trying to force something to happen ... gets blurry.  When is enough enough?  When you're satisfied that you've given it your best last shot?  When you're foolishly clinging to something that is probably not meant to be?

Being a person who has immense difficulty accepting failure, I've certainly held fast to many a thing long past its expiration date.  I've doled out too many chances to people who didn't deserve it.  I've given friends the benefit of the doubt, when clearly calling to see how I'm doing never crosses their minds.  But what's really weighing heavily on me at the moment is my career path.

I have a useless master's degree that hasn't been put to use in nearly 4 years.  I invested 7 years of my life in college, worked 2 years in my field, and now can't even get a job close to what my degree should be worth.  Am I desperately clinging to my "investment" because of what it *should* have earned me by now, under some delusion that the seven hundredth job application-resume-cover letter-transcript-reference letter sent out will pay off with a position after all this time?

Ironically, I DID give up on this career 3 years ago.  I gave away all of my books and resources and 99% of the materials I had spent years gathering.  But after trying in vain to get any kind of other job, I have found my degree essentially useless for that purpose.  In fact, I could have gotten more job offers with JUST a high school diploma.  So I tried once again to get the job I am licensed to do and loved at one time.  It's not happening.

Honestly, I just want to say "f**k it."  I am so blessed tired of begging for a job I don't even know if I want anymore.  I have screwed the whole daggone thing up: life, love, work, home, friendship.  *sigh*